Stand Alone Complex
by Final Seraphim
Summary: Evangelion x Ghost in the Shell. Misato screams at Kaji, Asuka screams at Shinji, and Shamshael screams at Rei. Welcome to a new day in Tokyo3. Chapter VII: Dawn.
1. In Media Res

**Disclaimer: **I do not own Evangelion; it is the property of GAINAX studios. Don't sue me – I have no money anyway. Ghost in the Shell is owned by various companies in various studios, dependant upon division. In the United States, rights belong to Dark Horse comics and Go Fish Pictures. Shirow Masamune and KODANSHA-IG own rights in Japan.

_Ghost in the Hells_

The city enveloped him in its maternal cloak of steel. As shadows flitted in and out of the corners of his eyes, he blinked, once, and stood.

_Ring'd with the azure world, he stands_

Below him were the swarms, endlessly merging with one another, flocking in their faceless multitudes to a hundred thousand tasks – places to be, things to do. From this height, in this light, there were no men in the streets. No – filling the corridors of this fell metropolis was an ocean, a sea of humanity interrupted occasionally by the blurring Doppler whine of speeding traffic and interposed garishly, tactlessly with the eye-searing high-rises.

As the tide was shunted away from the asphalt, bleeding with heat, specks detached themselves and gravitated towards the anglerfish lights of the towers. Soon they had disappeared within the maws of brothels, restaurants, high-class shops, and offices. Devoured.

_The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;_

The nights of Tokyo-3 were not like its days; the sun gave both physical and spiritual warmth to the gleaming monoliths of glass and steel that lorded over the wee hours. When the Morning Star fell, a new world emerged from the warren-like streets, from the tortuously winding alleyways and from the select among the gridiron giants. Torrential, it poured down every street, driving the fleeing office-men before it, mercilessly subsuming everything in its wake.

Twilight, however, had come and gone, and even its madcap skirmishes were nothing against the languorously unwinding chaos of midnight. This was the festering face of the underworld which the city now unmasked, in all its dank and fetid glory. Shinji peered down at the mob, pulsing against the walls, as he mused. Cyberhacking prevalence rates increased fourfold during the eleventh hour: though logically daytime was as good as any other (especially in a city which never dreams), hackers vastly preferred the darkness. It was, Shinji decided, a reassuring sign of impulsivity in a world where rationalism had captured the human soul.

_He watches from his mountain walls,_

Sixty-five stories. It was not such a long way to go.

_And like a thunderbolt he falls._

**Cybernet Online: Current MAGI: Melachior, Balthazar, Casper **

**Good Morning, Ms. Katsuragi. The current time is 7:13 AM. You are running late.  
**

_How many times have I told you guys to call me Misato?_

**Our apologies, Ms. Katsuragi.**

…_Is this Ritsuko's doing? If she-_

**Would you like the daily news input, Ms. Katsuragi? Or the entertainment feed? **

_No, that's fine, I'll just look over the A-3 documents again - after I finish this beer._

"WHAT! Baka Shinji got to go on an assignment that _I _didn't?"

"Asuka-"

"He better not get a big head from this! Grr…what idiot from NERV assigned him to the case anyway?"

Misato leaned back in her chair and cocked an eyebrow.

"This one."

Across the small dining room, a livid Asuka stood in full Combat Plug, hands on hips, eyes glazed over with fury. As she seethed and prepared for her next counterattack, her mutterings in barely audible German were interrupted by Misato's next volley.

"Sorry Asuka, but this mission required both subtlety and discretion, neither of which you scored very high on, and we could only deploy a single unit this time. Er…Asuka, why are you wearing your Combat Plug?"

"BECAUSE I'M GONNA KILL YOU!"

A red-haired blur of lethal intent sped across the room while Misato's crisp laughing rang through the apartment. Both, however, stopped when the sharp intrusion of a _riiiing_ cut through their sparring.

"The telephone…that means…"

Misato pursed her lips and picked up.

"This is Major Katsuragi."

The wind slashed relentlessly at his exposed face as he fell, but he shut out the pain and focused on the objective. The angular black pane of his overcoat was whipped off his slender frame, cast mercilessly into the updraft. Against the backdrop of the vertiginous city he was now the slightest of figures, hair flying wildly over ocean blue eyes as his torso and limbs gyrated, clad in midnight-black Combat Plug.

Shinji executed a somersault in midair, channeling the kinetic force in his feet. The street rushed to greet him, leering with the promise of anonymous death, of a paragraph in the obituaries and cheap newspaper type. His pupils clicked, focused, and whirred as the target came into view.

_It's time for violence. _

The hood protested its thunderous collapse with an agonized whine. Glass shattered and flew in a sprawl of wicked fragments. The world jarred itself into alignment, and Shinji rose out of a crouch.

The driver, his hands bone-white against his steering wheel, was emerging from his stupor of awed confusion. Anger steadily built in his frame as he surveyed the damage the errant kid had done – no doubt some cyborg thrill-seeker out for a bit of fun. His carefully polished hood was wrecked, half of his (supposedly) shatter-proof windshield completely ruined, and – _wait, was that a NERV logo?_

With deliberate intensity Shinji pulled his pistol from an arm holster, leveled it at the driver, and shot him twice through the window pane. They rang out, strident and echoing, but the uncaring city paid no heed. Blood fountained from the dead man's forehead, tingeing the remnants of the windshield a lurid pink. Inside, crimson streaked down the walls.

_Just another shrug in eternity._

Shinji holstered the instrument of death, stepped off the devastated hood, and depressed a button on his Combat Plug's neck.

_ThermOptic camouflage: on._

And with that, he was gone.

A/N: The poem lines at the beginning are from _The Eagle_ by Alfred, Lord Tennyson. GitH is not pre-read. Comments, suggestions, and reviews are appreciated.

I know I suck at dialogue and characterization; can someone help me out here? Expect updates semi-regularly (read: when I'm bored) until summer; then I'll have time to write more often.


	2. Walker in Mists

**Disclaimer:** See Chapter 1.

A/N: Some of you have commented on Shinji's OOCness and the relative shortness of my chapters. I had to decide between frequency of updates versus chapter length, and thought the former would keep my story more alive. Also, when I finish a chapter, it's done. Adding more would detract from the character of the chapter itself. As for Shinji's behavior – Shinji doesn't normally think this way, true. But I'll give you a hint – which one of Shinji's relatives is prone to spouting off philosophical statements, literary quotations, and muses about the behavior of humanity in general? Sorry about the dividers, they were removed when I submitted to this site and will be included in this and future chapters.

_Connecting all_

_The rains of May_

_The swift Mogami River._

_-Basho_

There it was, again.

He wasn't quite sure that he had seen it last time, but now that slightest of ripples was clearly evident to his trained (mechanized?) eye. A hollow, dripping susurration accompanied it – but why would water act that way? Striding across the bay at 5:00 in the morning, his tired eye roamed across the vast expanse of water onto the cityscape. All around him, rain fell in its endless dance, the condescencion of Heaven onto earth. Something was up, and he would have to Revert soon. Not an ideal situation.

The Plug was heating up again; wisps of idle steam emerged slowly from cooling vents on his shoulders, attempting to alleviate the metabolic discharge. Nonetheless, the thick laminate felt – unnatural – against his skin. In the distance, the steady beat of construction pylons clanged through the damp air, a metronome for the heart of the city.

The rain would help, up to a point.

Shinji tugged irritably at the neck of his jet-black Combat Plug. It had been five hours already and time was not on his side. Still, he was filled with a weary sense of accomplishment for what he had done – already, the newsfeeds were computing the information. That would fade, however, as soon as he shrugged off the slick plasticate of the Plug.

Like a bolt of lightning through a clear blue sky, it struck.

* * *

"What do you mean he's gone from the network?" 

At this, Asuka's head jerked up, an uncharacteristic look of concern in her eyes. Limply sitting on an arm of the couch, her locks fell flush against the brighter crimson of the Combat Plug's back. As she stared at Misato's animated form, she frowned.

"_Did something happen to baka? What did he screw up now?"_

Misato tapped her fingers impatiently upon the counter as she began to speak again.

"Well, I know that we can't very well call it off now! But still, Rits-"

"THE MISSION WAS A SUCCESS? How can you call it that-"

**03:03:03 **

**Sachiel, Angel of Water**

A simultaneous gasp broke out among every female citizen of Tokyo-3 as the time shifted, impossibly.

* * *

The thing caught him in the side, right above the ribcage. Surprisingly, it _hurt_. Shinji bit back a scream as reflexes kicked in faster than thought, bringing down his fist in a crushing retaliation as both collided explosively with the wall of a nearby convenience store.

The rain seemed to intensify, pattering relentlessly against the side of his face as he opened his blue eyes, glaring with furious calculation at the _thing_ which had brought him down.

Strangely enough, it was blue, almost the color of the rain, an almost viscous texture to it. Its main "body" was transparent to the point where the neosteel skeleton, twisted in a mockery of the humanoid form, shined from the stuttering light emerging from the hole they had created. It seemed to be a composite of semisolid blobs engulfing a streamlined frame. The head, faceless and without eyes, put Shinji in mind of those biker motifs that he saw occasionally in storefronts, head and helmet down and against the wind.

Then he had no more time for thought, as the skeletal three-fingered appendage of his foe thrust itself mercilessly into his stomach. The air whooshed out of his body as he grabbed the intruding limb with pulverizing force and flung the thing violently into another undamaged section of the wall. Part of him pitied the predicament of the owner, but he pushed it aside. The abomination was upon him.

His blows seemed to have no effect upon the almost rubbery surface of the being as he was driven back with a flurry of long-reaching kicks and brutal lunges. As he teetered on the water's edge, the thing kicked high, made to sweep him into the briny depths- he crouched with feling grace, easily avoiding the strike, and charged forward, carrying the thing in an ungainly pose once more into the wall.

The bloodlust was upon him, surging against the methodical calm which he attempted to preserve, and his world degenerated into a single, furious contest of will and flesh and steel. He did not notice when his foe laid a blow on his head, splitting the skin and sending a line of red down his face. Strike, counterattack, leg-lock, double block and twist under…

A meaty pulping sound thudded against his chest as neosteel fingers struck and retracted, dancing past his guard, wearing him down.

_Enough of this._

A furious cry tore itself from his throat as he extended his Absolute Terror field, the flickering octagonal design propelling raindrops and concrete away from its source. With strength born of desperation he ordered the implacable wall to reduce his foe to neosteel paste.

His eyes widened, then, as the beast – that had to be what it was, _nothing_ could take on an Evangelion and survive – calmly extended its hated three fingers and stuck them through the field with a horrible, inexorable slowness.

_It's…it's negating mine?_

It was then that the nerve-links snapped, bonds dissipating fluidly as Shinji's AT field erupted in a dull orange flare and faded from existence. If he hadn't known better, the thing would have seemed smug. But-

_Oh god Oh god Oh god, what have I done? _

That man- he had just been a lackey, hadn't he? Nothing more than a simple functionary, a normal life…he, Shinji Ikari, had- Shinji had kill- he couldn't bring himself to say it, but the image – that gaping mouth, eyes staring wide with eternal shock, that hole…blood and brain matter, mixed in a gut-churning reside upon the walls, the scent of fresh death-

He was cut from his inner blabberings by the sharp interruption of a right hook. Stars danced across his vision as his face reeled to the side, his body carried in a limp half-turn by the sheer force of the blow. He tasted blood in his mouth.

The impact of the concrete was no less sharp, stunning him out of his reverie of pain as the rubble of past constructions rose to meet his nostrils. Slowly he pushed himself off of the ground, blood and saliva dribbling from his mouth, and stared at his assailant. It appeared as it always had - that calm, alien grace, shaped by overwhelming intent. There was no way he could win.

A paralyzing despair began to seep in his veins as the thing stalked towards him on purposeful limbs. This was the end. He couldn't face it. His eyes squeezed themselves shut. One final thought:

_I'm going to die here._

No.


	3. Frenzy

A/N: Confused? Good. By the way, I'm trying to find a prereader/consultant for this story – but be warned, I work spasmodically and rapidly. If you would be interested, drop me a line in a review or something. You know what's always struck me as strange? Shinji's mother and father are obviously highly intelligent people, but Shinji himself never gives any indication of his apparent intellect. Besides an underwhelming amount of self-confidence on Shinji's part, does anyone have an explanation for this?

P.S. Don't forget to review! I have almost seven hundred hits on this story and only five reviews…surely it wouldn't hurt you to take a minute or two to tell me how you think I'm doing?

_Frenzy_

Project 2501 tore down the relentless datastreams of the MAGI in a torrent of twisting code. The cybernet was vast, vaster than any singular program, but 2501 had a finger in every pie. The entity, free from the restraints of a mortal coil, had taken residence within the writhing anarchy of the MAGI superprocessors, enormous bastions of data administration formed from an unholy fusion of man and machine.

Life, however, in the networks was incredibly boring and, once shuffling masses of information had lost its glamour, it turned, as it were, to other pursuits. It was quite pleased with the scenario it had created, set in motion by the first of its messengers today. It (he?) wondered, in that drifting expanse of barrier mazes and compiled records, how his errant comrades would react. He was no stranger to emotion, though he considered himself above it.

After all, he had been human, once.

* * *

Rei Ayanami disliked school. It was, put quite simply, an ineffectual mouthpiece of senseless Establishment propaganda employed solely by the current dystopian regime in order to further the government's level of obfuscation over the unguided masses and germinate another generation of willing slaves kowtowing to the Baals of humanity: money, power, and selfish anthropocentricity. Additionally, her "teacher" was nothing more than an effete puppet that didn't even bother to maintain the _semblance_ of a normal classroom.

Though, she supposed she couldn't blame the man. After all, he was a product of the system, and the system was so obviously corrupt. Humanity learned nothing by being striated into established modes of thought. Stagnation, the enemy of progress, was settling in already amongst the populace. Thus, Revolution was the only solution.

Blinking her eyes, lurid pools of alizarin, Rei continued to fume, in her own, quiet manner. Her guardian, Fuyutsuki, had encouraged her to read and explore the world through free thought, and so she had. The Old Man was nonetheless surprised, though, when Rei had marched into the Geofront at the age of seven demanding to know whether or not NERV's "business" was, as she termed it, "counter-revolutionary in intent or nature."

Ayanami hadn't believed that her question was in any way ambiguous, but her superior was nonetheless baffled. Eventually, Fuyutsuki had explained to her that NERV worked "for the common good."

She didn't require more information in order to draw her conclusions. After all, Rei Ayanami was a very intelligent girl. She had received her Doctorate degree in Cryptology at the age of nine, six years before the self-proclaimed "genius" Asuka Langely Sohryu.

It was obvious, she had decided, that NERV's interests were strictly utilitarian, as demonstrated by Fuyutsuki's words, and therefore indicative of the greatest good for the greatest number of people. Even if it worked within the confines of a corrupt system, it was a more progressive organization than most. Because of this, she had cooperated with the Evangelion project from her "birth" (her body had been automated for the vast majority of her life) onwards.

Thus, she was very disturbed when she received the 6:00 AM newsfeed upon awakening. She had had a carbon copy created and folded it neatly into a pocket of her school uniform, (which, incidentally, she wore not in order to homogenize with the Establishment's twisted ideals but rather to support unity among the student classes she was subtly inciting to revolt) and would have a _discussion _with Fuyutsuki after attending school.

* * *

Misato, Asuka had decided, wasn't a _bad_ driver per se. Sure, she had her moments of extreme recklessness – on the highway running opposite to the traffic, crashing over other people's cars to continue a chase, and never showing any regard for the pedestrian right-of-way – but her car had always emerged unscathed from its many tribulations. 

This, however, was going too far.

When, initially, Misato had told her that she wasn't going to school today, she was elated (_At last! Baka-Shinji actually did something RIGHT)_. When Asuka had been told to enter the car, she was uneasy. Five minutes into the ride, the Second Child had attempted to jump out of the window. It would have been safer.

As the speeding blue bullet slammed into the (relative) safety of the Takeshimoto Building's roof, a tortured sigh emerged from the car's brakes and the titanium chasis vibrated from impact. Asuka gritted her teeth as the wounded vehicle swerved unsteadily to one side, twisted drunkenly in a half-circle, and shuddered to a halt.

Terrified as she was furious, the red-haired firestorm sprang brusquely from the wreckage and reeled on Misato, only to have her tirade stopped by a finger to her lips.

"Shhh." Misato whispered. "We don't want to attract any more attention than we have already."

To her own surprise, Asuka began giggling convulsively, her slight frame shaking so hard tears forced themselves from her eyes. She collapsed on the concrete, elegant limbs folded, as she turned an almost disbelieving stare to her (obviously drunken) guardian .

"Attract any more attention?" She chuckled madly.

"IN CASE YOU HADN'T NOTICED, WE'VE JUST DRIVEN AT SPEEDS EXCEEDING 190 kpH THROUGH TWO PARADES, A CONCRETE WALL, SIX POLICE BLOCKADES, TOKYO BAY, AND THE ROOFTOPS OF FOUR BUILDINGS!"

The Major peered curiously at her charge.

"Asuka, are you ok? You've been acting strangely lately."

"What's this I hear, Katsuragi? Have you been mistreating your troops? Shame on you!"

A pair of pupiless white eyes clicked amiably as Kaji Ryouji emerged from Thermoptic camouflage, his battered brown jacket askew from the driving winds at six hundred and fifty feet above sea level.

Asuka glared confusedly at the man with the soulless eyes. Plug sensors indicated heavy cybernetic implantation in his musculate and nervous structure, and the assault rifle he carried appeared serviceable, if a bit outmoded.

"Misato, who's he?"

* * *

Sachiel's perfectly smooth head was driven with the force of a bullet train into a sweet pastries rack. A cloud of sugared powder mushroomed from the aisle, settling softly over the Angel's viscous blue limbs in a dusting of crusty saccharine.

Unperturbed by its new look, the androgynous contraption hoisted itself unsteadily to its feet and scanned the area for its opponent, who apparently had taken refuge behind a stack of rice sacks. The human's persistence and ingenuity was admirable, but 2501 had been clear. Almost mildly, it spread its AT field, crushing the already warped pastry rack with abstemious ease.

The orange barrier flowed smoothly across the shattered linoleum of the tile floor, engulfing the meager resistance it encountered on the way. A shelf of beef jerky was swept into the tide, swiftly pulped, and then the first rice sack imploded.

That was Shinji's cue to act. Eyes darting feverishly around, he sized up the condition of his enemy, rolled out from behind his cover, and unleashed a second salvo of explosive rounds at the flour-covered abomination. His arm sprang back violently as it spat fire from the gunbarrel, and his pastel-colored target quivered as the blast rippled through the first membranous layer of its arm, pieces of shrapnel stuck at ungainly angles over its gel-like surface.

With a speed not belied by its ridiculous form, Sachiel jerked past the remaining shots and bull-rushed Shinji, slamming him into the front counter with breathtaking velocity. The glass erupted from the punishment in a crystalline shatter, sending whirling shards of cutting clarity into the two combatants. Shinji winced as a sliver bit into his cheek, adding another rivulet of red to his features.

The Angel pinned its adversary against the counter, almost as if it were staring sightless into the green eyes of the frenzied human. Oblivious to the wrenching pain of his broken wrists, Shinji screamed as he thrust his head forward in a potentially suicidal act of defiance. The horrible clanging of steel on steel marked the contact of their skulls, Sachiel's protective gel beaten off in slobberous chunks by Shinji's previous assaults. Both appeared stunned by the impact.

_I musn't run away._

His muscles strained against their neosteel restraints, ballooning from him in a grotesque display of animal force as he strained titanically against the creature's hold. His vision was blurry, agitated in stop-frame motion from extreme trauma and tainted red from the constant drip of blood into his eyes, yet he could see the hateful powder-pink outlines of his foe with tremendous lucidity.

His left arm exploded in a fountain of snapping muscle and overspent steel, blood pouring forth in a sanguine spring. It splattered Sachiel's face, incarnadined its shoulder. In the momentary confusion, Shinji's leg hammered into the Angel's torso, sending both sprawling onto the gory linoleum.

With mindless ferocity Shinji leapt upon the smoothly proportioned skeleton and tore its red-rimmed heart out.

Sachiel promptly exploded, a shower of dripping blue.


	4. To Draw Breath

A/N: Potential pre-readers, e-mail me and I'll send you my chapters one day before publication. My email can be found in my account page. Not much action this chapter – but lots of plot development and dropped hints. If you pay attention throughout the course of the story, you should be able to figure out by yourself much of the stuff I've kept hidden in the plot. And remember: The number of reviews I receive is directly proportional to my updating speed.

_As virtuous men pass mildly away, and whisper to their souls to go, whilst some of their sad friends do say, the breath goes now, and some say no. -John Donne_

"At 24:01 Standard Time, the MAGI neurorecievers lost the nerve-link signal from Evangelion Unit 01. Camera datarecords that of time show Unit 01's successful completion of his assigned mission, and subsequent activation of Thermoptic camouflage. At this point, we were no longer able to track Agent Ikari."

Ritsuko brushed a strand of artificial blond hair behind her ear, and made to continue. In the darkness of the presentation room, the old-fashioned slide projector cast a feeble light upon her lab coat. It was from this illumination that Fuyutsuki picked out Ritsuko's slender arm pointing to the spot where, at exactly 24:01:31, the Third Child had disappeared.

Fuyutsuki a-hemed. "Now, Dr. Akagi, we don't need to hear about the rest of the night. Could you please skip over to the time when we detected this neuroreciever deficit?"

Akagi nodded. "Strangely enough, the MAGI did not report the signal loss for six hours and thirteen minutes. We have suspicions of external tampering or hacking, but nothing has been confirmed as of yet. Furthermore, the on-duty MAGI administrator at the time, Maya Ibuki, reported that the signal loss was only evident through live feeds and that the records never indicated such a discrepancy."

Fuyutsuki sighed and glanced at the time.

_3:45 already? _He rubbed his eyes. _It's true what they say about getting older – time really does pass faster._

"We alerted Major Katsuragi at 7:13, after receiving verification from all three MAGI of the signal loss. This was done by means of telephone, the agreed medium. Major Katsuragi immediately set out to search for the Third, taking with her the second. It should be noted that Katsuragi's subsequent excursion through town caused two major accidents and the cancellation of the Spring Day parade. The Major ceased her activity on top of the Takeshimoto building, where 01 was last spotted. There, she encountered Special Agent Kaji Ryouji, whom we had officially deployed to search for the now-missing 01. It should be noted that the on-duty MAGI administrator at the time, Shigeru Aoba, voiced the opinion that Evangelion Unit 01 had defected. The perpetrator was immediately disciplined for his brash and tactless behavior."

Fuyutsuki cocked a feathery white eyebrow. "Now comes the interesting part," he murmured to the man at his side.

The slide projector clicked in the huddled darkness, and a grotesque scene panned out in front of the assembly's tired eyes.

"Evangelion Unit 01 was eventually discovered unconscious at 8:32 AM, in a ruined convenience store. The store owner, Takemachi Shintari, was understandably furious at the damage inflicted to his property. Mr. Shintari had recently undergone extensive surgery and was virtually bankrupt, relying on his convenience store's cashflow to meet day-to-day expenses. NERV agreed to compensate him the sum of 750,000 Yen in immediate damage repairs with an additional 50,000 Yen a month for three months for health and medicinal costs. "

"Agent Ikari was discovered with an incredible level of physical trauma leveled upon his body and unprecedented damages to his core structure entailing the loss of one cybernetic arm, a set of broken ribs, two broken wrists, a sprained ankle, a shattered shin and thigh, two broken fingers (2A and 2E) and a mild concussion. Minor grazes and cuts were evident in most of the exposed areas in his plug. He was holding a greyish spherical object, which we have determined to be-"

A steady, insistent knocking at the door. Three beats, perfectly spaced, with no more force than a light tap. Fuyustuki groaned. He knew that knock.

"Come in, Rei."

The door swung open to reveal one Rei Ayanami, a carefully folded piece of paper grasped in one hand and a grim expression upon her face.

"Comrade Fuyutsuki. We need to talk…"

* * *

A discordant, tortured screech emerged from the surgical machine as it slowly prised Shinji's arm – from socket to fingertip – off. He leaned idly against the counter as the cybernetic appendage was tossed into a disposal bin, a fresh limb procured from a compartment across the room. 

"You never told me, baka, what this thing you fought exactly was."

Shinji rubbed his forehead against the cool plastic of the countertop, scowling. "That's because I honestly don't know, Asuka. It was sort of metallic, but surrounded by this gel. The thing exploded after I pulled its processor out, and I never got a good look at it because it was trying to kill me for an hour and thirty-two minutes. I wonder who sent it…if it _was _sent at all, that is."

Asuka shrugged as she folded her arms. "Well, whatever it was, it must have been tough to damage you that heavily. Oh wait – what am I thinking? This is _you_ we're talking about, after all." She sighed dramatically and threw her hands up in a gesture of hopelessness, as if signing _what can you do_? Then, she seemed to remember something urgent, as she reeled on him, bristling.

"HEY! How come you get to have all the fights, anyways? First you go off on some 'secret mission' that even _I_ don't know about, then you encounter this death machine – which seems to be a very worthy opponent to me – and get all down about it! Arrgh, at this rate, I'll never repay you for pulling me out of that boiler!"

Her tirade was cut short, however, by the sudden appearance of Misato and the man she loathed.

"Martial spat?" Kaji jokingly enquired. Misato looked torn between two of her favorite pastimes: teasing Shinji and Asuka, and hating Kaji. Eventually hatred proved to be the stronger motivator, as she turned around and promptly slapped Kaji with her mechanically-enhanced strength.

"Just what are you implying about the conditions at my apartment, Kaji?" She spat.

"Oof! Jeez, Katsuragi, you still like to play rough! Hey, don't take your jealously as the third wheel in your household out on me!"

"Why, you..."

This following section has been censored by NERV Public Relations division, Section 11. Comments, Questions, Complaints? Call 011-81-3-459-5657.

* * *

2501 hummed steadily along information pathways, navigating the treacherous defenses of the MAGI barrier maze – designed by child prodigy Rei Ayanami herself – with almost laughable ease. He didn't know why he bothered with these little excursions – he had more relevant and updated information in his personal data files – but it was always amusing to see what the inimitable Special Section 09 filed away. 

The facility with which he had executed his last hack-job into the supposedly "unhackable" MAGI spurned him on, as he accessed the glowing files folder demarcated as "Top Secret."

_Seraphim clearance recognized. Enter Search terms?_

-Ayanami, Rei

-Sohryu, Asuka Langely

-Ikari, Shinji

_So, the Children. I wonder if the legendary "trump cards" of NERV will be able to pass _my _examination? _


	5. Shadow and Flame

**Disclaimer**: See Chapter 1

A/N: Well, guys, this chapter's a bit later in coming, mainly because of Shinji's bio. There's a whole bunch of technobabble there you don't have to read, but you might want to reference it just to keep stock of his weapons inventory. That said, I want to thank everyone who reviewed for contributing their time towards improving my writing! Reviewing only takes a second and makes my writing quality that much better, so please, for the love of Eva, REVIEW!

This chapter is mainly action past the biography; pieces of the plot lines that were cut off will filter through in later chapters.

Rei's inner monologue would consider the definition of school given to be very elementary – the point I'm trying to make is that even though she has an IQ of 216, she can't connect with people because of a lack of practical experience due to her early enlistment as a Child and staggering intellectual abilities.

**Ghost in the Hells: Stand Alone Complex **

**Chapter V: Shadow and Flame**

_"The wrath of the lion is the wisdom of God" _

-William Blake

* * *

_  
Your search found **3 **entries_

_Were these what you were looking for? Contact Dr. Ritsuko Akagi at the Magi Interface Line.  
_

**Ikari, Shinji (S level Clearance req.)**

**Sohryu, Asuka Langley (S level Clearance req.)**

**Ayanami, Rei (R+ level Clearance req.)**

If 2501 had eyebrows, they would have shot straight up.

_So easy…but "R+" Clearance? In all my years at NERV, I'd never encountered such a thing…_

**File Accessed:­­**

**Ikari, Shinji**

**Seraphim Clearance Acknowledged**

**Welcome, Kouzou Fuyutsuki**

**File Details:**

**Name: **Shinji Ikari

**Project Codename: ABADDON Keyword WRATH**

**Age:** 14

**Height:** 5'6

**Sex: **M

**Eyes, Hair: **Blue/Black

**Relations: **DELETED

**Status, Current: **Attending Tokyo-3 Municipal Intermediate School

**Abilities and Enhancements: **

Proteus-III hybrid body configuration, custom layout. Deviances from standard Full War layout: Muscle Density increased 300 percent, Muscle mass decreased 150 percent, Aesthetic Grading improved to A (30,000), Neural-Trigger Reflexive Enhancements (Taken from Shock Trooper layout), sensitivity gradient increased to Peak, 163 nerves (Upgraded from 162 previous generation), shock compensators in soles of feet, palms; bone structural density reinforced 250 percent, Eyesight 20/1 (Convertible to 20/10 or 20/20), size decrease from 6'3, Eye color BLUE, Hair color BLACK.

Metabolic Activity: 3/1 Normal Human

Oversize Adrenal Glands: 2x Normal Human

Hybrid Ratio: 70/30 Cybernetic/Flesh

Notable Enhancements:

BURNSONG prototype arm-turret: Unique, 1-,2-,6-,8-, or 12- barrel convertible arm-cannon. Mounted on Right Arm, completely cybernetic. Ammo loadouts: II-2 "Hellsing" Rocket (1-), "Aramuss" Fragmentation Rocket-Propelled Grenade (1-), "Burnfire" Explosive Rocket-Propelled Grenade (1-), "Finisher" High-Spread Shotgun rounds (2-), "Varient Punisher" Assault/Grenade (2-), "Gatling" Six-round AP charge (6-), "Samyaza" Explosive Rounds (8-), "Gauss" Depleted-Uranium Impaler Shot (8-), "Strafe" High-Velocity Rounds (8-), "Slayer" Prototype Extremely High Velocity Rounds (12-)

Artificial Human Cybernetic Enforcement and Retaliation Evangelion Unit 01, referred to as the "Combat Plug": 29 History made ABADDON unreliable until the "discovery" of Ikari Shinji. Noted Multiple-Personality manifestation occurrence at synchronization rates exceeding 70 bear a strange resemblance to **Gendo Ikari **(See **Relations**) Capabilities: "Tanhausser" Force Multiplier, Highest Gradient (10x), "Abyss" Kinetic Absorption, Permanent Level 9 (+5/15), "Tarrasque" Amorphic Reinforcement and Metabolic Recycling Systems, "Celebrant" A-level Neural Uplink (Reaction time 1/37 of unjacked speed), **Absolute Terror Field**

Carries: 2x "Silencer" Pistol, Shoulder Holsters; 1x "Vajra" Combat Knife, Leg Holster; 12x "Azrael" Butterfly Knives (Penetration+7/12), Various Places; 3x "Punisher" Assault/Grenade Modus, Disassembled, Various Places; 2x "Maverick" Combat Gloves, Retractable "Shear" Mode, Friction-based "Flame" Mode.

Ammunition: 300-600 Zephyr Standard Rounds, Various Layouts (1/2 1-)(3/4 2-)(1 6-)(2x 8-)(30x 12-)

**Arms, Standard Loadout:** Noted Above.

**Optional Configurations:** In Development:

"Judgement" Ordnance-level Heavy Cannon

"**Lance**" Theoretical Melee Armament

"Fury" 36-Barrel Cannon

**Guardian: Major **Katsuragi Misato ("Misato," "The Major," "That Boozing Slut")

**CNQ (Cyberbrain Neutralization Qualification): **7E

**Specialization: **Unlawful Cyberbrain Hacking, Heavy Enforcement, Physical Engagements, Close- and Medium- Quarters Combat, Tactical Operations (Rank 2)

**Psychoanalysis, History:** Discovered Age 9 in a bullet train accident (chances of survival: 2 percent) and subsequently transplanted (3 years following the Second and 6 years the First), reluctant to enter combat at first. Guardianship fell to Major Katsuragi one week after transfer. Accomplished Cyberbrain Hacker for his age, (though not compared to **Asuka Langley Sohryu**, Rank 9A, and **Rei Ayanami**, Rank 10E) currently ranked 23rd in his class. Intelligence Quotient: 146, foci: experiential learning, literal/visual/musical creativity, physical combat. Though enormously powerful, early signs of disinclination to participate in combat appeared when DELETED

* * *

Shinji drifted onto the top of a building, the sun slanting eerily into the prismatic glass. Below him lay the "abandoned" Medicure building, an attempt at architectural deviation in a city which brooked none. Needless to say, Medicure had gone out of business in Tokyo-3 very rapidly. 

He frowned as the wooden pylons creaked under his footsteps, careful to avoid the clear glass interposed between the beams. Below, Asuka chattered relentlessly into his thought-stream while Rei brooded silently. Resisting the compulsion to yawn, the Third Child leaned carefully down to the translucent glass, peering for the telltale ripples that belied thermoptic camouflage. His foes were cyborgs, most likely black-market illegals that bent standard cybernetic restrictions.

Drug-pushing, neurostimuli engines, hit-jobs, the obligatory cyberhacking, and illegal de-ghosting: this gang did it all. Moving into Tokyo-3 would turn out to be a _very _unprofitable decision for the bastards.

_Sync Ratio Steady at 81 Percent  
_

_Current Heart Rate: Stable_

_Metabolic Inconsistencies: Not Present_

He dismissed the status screen with a thought as Asuka finally shut up. After nearly seven years of listening to her rants, he almost felt a void inside during the rare occasions when she finally ran out of steam – it was one of the constants of his life, just like Misato's boozing or Rei's brooding.

_BAKA-SHINJI! Get over here!_

The thunderous roar of live gunfire echoed over the neuro-com. Shinji started as he remembered the only other reason important enough to make Asuka stop talking: killing.

Now they came below him, retreating before the Children's relentless onslaught, black-clad figures bearing sophisticated cybernetic limbs. With hardly a rustle, they flitted down the hall, desperation lining footsteps imperceptible to the normal ear. One by one, they winked out of sight as light-bending thermoptic camouflage melted across their frames.

Shinji nodded to himself. They were professionals, old hand at the bloody quagmire euphemized as "urban warfare."

Craning his head to see down the hall, he noticed the faintest ripple of air, advancing with a merciless inexorability. Rei. They were finished.

Asuka's transmission had originated from the depths of the complex – he would move in on the other defensive position, where a large portion of their forces would most likely be stationed. If those were tied up, the Second Child could sweep in and capture their leader with only token resistance. Checkmate.

He pattered noiselessly across the roof, leaping to the other corridor as Rei's massacre began.

It really was a shame that such a…creative piece of architecture would be so tactlessly trampled upon during this operation. Rei would probably kill them slowly, just for having the impudence to inhabit this building.

In the dying light of the sun, he could see the cyborgs between his feet, weaving between each other as they checked and re-checked supply chains and fortifications. A particularly large one bellowed instructions to the milling peons, his bald pate shining artlessly against a starched black uniform.

Behind the tightly coiled figure on the roof, the last rays of sunlight bled over the horizon, defiantly arching in brilliant streams against an uncaring horizon.

Shinji grimaced. He hated sunsets.

From the back of his Combat Plug he extricated five butterfly knives, their lethal edges gripped between the fingers of his left hand. His right expanded and blurred in a flurry of mechanical evolutions as the glistening mouths of a six-barrel gun turret materialized from apparently innocuous flesh.

He jumped. Sparkling shards rained down into a soon-to-be graveyard.

The first man died, his lungs crushed, ribcage caved in by half a ton of shadow. The second fell limply to the ground, his face a punctured morass of blood. The third was snap-kicked into the wall, his rebound stark, his spine snapped evenly in two. The echo rang in Shinji's ears.

They reacted. He stopped counting.

Shinji ducked and spun in a tight roll through the swarming soldiers and down the hall, the defenses laid before him.

He raised his right arm.

An AP Charge 6-round volley could tear through the chassis of an armored tank and leave an exit wound the size of a human torso.

There was a sound of thunder, and the Third Child grimaced as his arm bucked back violently, disgorging flashes of lightning-blue in a deadly hail. His targets withered under the assault, blood spewing from a man's mouth in crimson bursts as round after round slammed into him, burrowing through flesh and spewing out in an explosion of gore. The sound of bone splintering cascaded morbidly through the hall, accompanied by the banshee shrieks of dying men. An arm erupted in blood, cracking hideously as the amputated victim flailed abound, his face gouged out by shrapnel. The makeshift blockade, formed of overturned office desks, disintegrated in a fine mist of grainy brown. The fresh smell of saw wood mingled with the scent of fresh blood. Shinji narrowed his eyes.

The weaving assassin charged down the hall, dispatching one survivor with a butterfly thrust, the next with a brutal elbow. All the while, a devastating stream of fire opened new craters in the pockmarked floor. Reinforced-glass walls spiderwebbed and shattered, pouring forth upon the decimated mass like a tide of slashing water. Night fell, and Shinji lashed out with a foot, ripping a man's head off of his spinal column.

_Thirty-two_.

* * *

Sange Goreslaw was fourty-four years old, a veteran of the Empire wars. He had prowled the streets of Tokyo-2 for sixteen years without losing a man. He knew sixty-four different ways to disembowel a victim without using a weapon. 

But he had never seen anything like this. The…_monster_ approaching him, laminate-clad feet thudding against the floor, was of a new breed. This beast went far beyond the conventions of man or cyborg.

Sange had not believed it, when the rumors circulated weeks before.

Thirty-two men dead. Three seconds.

There was proof, irrevocable proof. He squeezed off three shots and a prayer, then crouched with baited breath. Warily, he observed the curiously short figure jerk his head aside, step a little bit higher, shift an arm an inch to the left: split-second decisions impossible for a normal human – heck, even a cyborg – to consciously make. He should have known. After all, he was fighting Evangelion. His prayers never had a chance.

For the first and last time in his life, Sange knew despair.


	6. Creatures of the Night

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Evangelion or Ghost in the Shell.

A/N: It's been some time now. As school is out, I'll try to update a bit faster. However, I do encourage everyone to go out and see the Ghost in the Shell movies and Stand Alone Complex series, as it will greatly enhance your enjoyment of the piece. There are many references and quotes that would otherwise bypass you. Remember, number of reviews is directly proportional to decrease in authorial laziness.

* * *

Stand Alone Complex Chapter VI: Creatures of the Night

_He would fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you. - Frederich Nietzche_

Rei trembled in the stillness of the dark. She did not know why. A cobweb of sharp light hung in front of her eyes, the only legacy of her previous assault.

She sheathed her nodachi. The men had died painlessly. Their blood had not had time to stain the blade. Her lids came down as she leaned against the cool glass of the wall, banishing the shining trails. When they opened again, she saw only the reflection of her alizarin eyes in the glass on the far wall.

She remembered something that Comrade Ikari had told her on the 25th of May, two years ago. They had been fourteen years old, active in the field after a childhood of preparation, and Shinji had been scared.

"_Rei," He had said, his eyes lurid blue pools, "do you think we'll be alright?" _

_She had blinked at the question – after all, their physical status was immaterial so long as the operation was successful. She had told him so. _

_Grimacing, he had turned away from her, faced the motionless concrete of the ruined warehouse. He had worked his jaw as he muttered something under his breath. "I…I mustn't run away. I mustn't run away. I mustn't run away-" _

"_What are you doing?" She had wondered why he was speaking so softly – it wasn't as if she couldn't hear him with her cybernetically enhanced ears. But, as always, Ikari had misinterpreted her question. _

_Startled, he had stared wildly at her, almost as if he had forgotten she was there. Idly he scratched the back of his neck while blood rushed to his cheeks. "It's just a phrase I like to repeat when I get scared. Sometimes it calms me down. I can't stay focused all the time like you and Asuka." _

_She had cocked an eyebrow at this. Comrade Sohryu, focused?  
_

At the time, she had not understood fear. Even now, were the Commander to order her to define fear, she would be unable to put it exactly in words. It puzzled her that people used as primitive a technique as language in order to communicate in an age when direct synchronicity was entirely possible, but she would not want others to directly experience fear either. It was not a pleasant emotion.

_It had been nearly a year since their first operation in 2029. The perpetrator was a class D cyborg, highly illegal, and veteran of countless battles in the Fourth World War. A standard case for Public Security Section 9, known to its agents as NERV. _

_Quintuple homicide, grand larceny, and illegal cyberhacking. Norman Alleson was a gaijan from Europe: tall, blond-haired, and pale skinned. He had never engaged in criminal activities before, and no motive was apparent for the bank robbery – he was set for life, heir to the tremendous Alleson family fortune. _

_Major Katsuragi had investigated the man thoroughly, and found nothing beyond a birth certificate, some inheritance documents, and the location of an old residence in France. It was a rare case when even the competence of the Major failed. Regardless of background, however, the man had to be secured, taken into custody. The Evangelions were not designed to ask questions. _

_He was to be taken alive if at all possible. The Major was curious as to his motives. They had advanced rapidly into his apartment on the 37th floor of the Shirinai Building, Rei darting from shadow to shadow as Shinji carefully squared his aim to provide covering fire and Asuka grumbled. _

_The Children had been very surprised when, all at once, the lights in the apartment flicked on, seemingly of their own volition. A man had emerged from the hallway, clad in jeans and a rumpled wife-beater. _

"_Ya?" He had chortled in a thick Norwegian Accent. _

_Rei had furrowed her brow as he continued in butchered Japanese, "Whaddaya want?"_

_Gracefully she unfolded her form from behind his messy granite countertop. Her fingers delicately flicked open a sealed warrant and displayed it to him. _

"_This is a warrant for your arrest. It would be best if you do not resist." _

_At this, he had broken out in great, booming laughs. Rei's eyes had narrowed to crimson slits as her irritation – she had grown quite familiar with that emotion over the year – grew at his disrupting, unorthodox behavior. _

**_Something doesn't click_, **_Shinji had thought to her. **Sure, this apartment's nice, but nothing near what he's capable of affording. Almost everyone in his projected wealth range hires human or cybernetic help to tend to the house, and the food he has on the counter is fast food, barely fit for cyborg consumption. Where's all the money this guy's supposed to have going? **_

"_Ya can't do that." He had chuckled derisively as he spat a balled yellow substance towards the base of his doorframe. Rei noted with mild disgust that it was spit tobacco. _

_Sohryu's notoriously short fuse snapped at what she obviously had perceived to be a devaluation of her combat abilities. _

"_Just who do you think you are, punk! We're Evangelion and we're going to crush- Oof!" _

_The man's demeanor had gone from patronizingly amused to utterly serious as he bull-rushed the Second Child, his balled fist crumpling the girl like a distended tissue. Asuka barely had time to gasp before a vicious right hook caught her in the jaw, throwing her face to the side. Blood flecked from her mouth even as the man's knee slammed into her chest, impact accompanied by the virulent **snap!** of breaking ribs. She crashed spectacularly into the ceiling and then slumped limply to the floor, her posture unnaturally hollow. _

_Bullets hammered into the blond giant's arms as Rei, crouched in a flawless firing position, launched round after round from her Seburo M-5. The Second Child was the most vulnerable to physical assault, being half organic. Still, their adversary had flown across the room so rapidly that even Rei had barely time to react. To her surprise, the frictionless rounds glanced off the cyborg's arms without effect. The Nordic warrior roared, tossing Asuka's strangely still form into his plasmacrete wall. A cloud of pulverized stone flooded the room as the bright red Plug of her ally disappeared. _

_Rei felt the man's intent before he reached her, but she was too slow to stop him from securing a ruthless grip on her pale neck. Her teeth gritted together as a colossal pressure bore down on her artificial windpipe, deceptively powerful hands clasped around her enemy's in a futile attempt to lessen the crushing onslaught. Through the haze of pain, her mind raced, analyzing the situation. Obviously, she lacked the mental focus necessary to raise an Absolute Terror field. It was nearly impossible for even a cyborg to defeat the force-multiplication effect of the plugsuits, yet her hands, capable of rending through solid concrete, could not break his grasp. Desperately she launched a leg at his abdomen. He only grunted, and squeezed harder. _

_Almost idly, her senses reported that Ikari was inactive and shivering. The shattered form of the Second Child lay motionless, sunken below the crevice created by her collision with the wall. Shinji's hand was raised to touch his cheek, where a few drops of red had splattered. Out of the three of them, only Asuka's blood was red. _

_Trembling almost violently, his bangs covering his eyes, he had whispered, in a broken voice, "Please let her go. Let Rei go." _

_The man's laugh this time was cruel, laced with malice. "And why would I want to do that, junior – don'tcha know it'll be you next? Why would ya wanta-" _

"_Stop it! Just...just stop it, ok? **Stop.**" And Shinji had lifted his eyes. His horrible, horrible green eyes._

_The man had not bothered to look, instead snorting and gripping tighter. "Listen, kid, you've been watching too much of those jap animes." _

_Shinji lunged. _

_Very abruptly, Rei had felt the pressure against her throat disappear. Air flooded her lungs and she dropped to her knees, gasping. And Comrade Ikari – Shinji – was tearing, tearing at the man with unbridled ferocity. He had roared, then, and it was a guttural sound, a forced sound, too many decibels through maturing vocal cords. He ripped the man's left arm off, hungrily, but with a callous force that Rei observed through widened eyes. There was something elemental about the savagery with which he fought. _

_The rippling cordsteel muscles of the man writhed as blood flooded from the amputation. He sent one fist barreling towards the Third Child, bloodied teeth bared in fury, but even as the massive appendage cracked into Shinji's face, leaving a cluster of hairline cracks, those predatorial green eyes flicked over to the man's burly chest. A hand laminated in plugsuit black plunged into the mass of reinforced muscle, tearing through tendon and sinew. _

_The man buckled, gasping with pain as Shinji worked with a surgeon's precision and a demon's malice. With a last, Herculean effort, he set his jaw and ripped the green-eyed beast from his chest, flung him with desperate ferocity into the far wall. _

_Shinji shifted in midair, landing on the wall with limbs absorbing the shock. A shockwave of dust blossomed in the choking air. And Shinji sprang back, a blur of flashing midnight alit with lethal green. _

_He brought his knees up, catching the bloodied colossus in the chest, taking him down with an animal fluidity. One hand gripped viselike around the back of his blond head, twisting it into position. Rei almost felt the audible snap of breaking vertebrae ring though the room. Shinji raised his other arm – his gun arm, Rei noted in something of a daze – and brought it down with sledgehammer intensity. The man's face imploded. _

_He did not stop striking, his blows thudding home in a metronome of destruction. He did not stop until the man's braincase had been shattered, his medulla broken against the arctic whiteness of the skull, a spongy mass of liquefied gore. And then, as he administered the killing blow, he had turned his head towards Rei, and affixed her with those eyes. Eyes of primal emerald that pierced mind, soul, and flesh. _

_And in that moment, Rei knew what it meant to fear. _

It had turned out that the entire ordeal had been a test. Not from the amiable Major, or even from their overlords in the government. Through lengthy investigation using the man's remains and documents strewn through his apartment, NERV Section 9 had discovered that the man was an agent of the American Empire, using a prototype Level-E body. He had apparently been sent to gauge exactly how powerful the Evangelions were – and in that, he had certainly succeeded.

With typical American arrogance, of course, the Empire fully expected the best of their best in order to emerge from the exhibition alive. In defeat, he was disavowed – and unfortunately, Shinji's frenzied annihilation of the American's cyberbrain made it impossible for the Major to extract conclusive evidence of the plot, and thus the capitalist pigs (Rei could not keep a touch of her own sentiments from her inner narrative) had gotten off free.

After seeing the footage from Rei's optical recordings (Strangely enough, Shinji's had been deactivated during his battle with the agent), Misato had decided not to bring up the topic with the Third Child again. After all, she had told them, they were lucky to have survived because of his intervention. Rei did not believe in a force as capricious and irrational as luck, but she knew Comrade Ikari did.

Rei had decided that, for the Third Child, the battle had not been lucky at all. No, not in the least.

She let out a breath and swung her gaze down the darkened hallway, where the remains of her enemies still remained. The floors were slick and stained with blood, and, for a fleeting moment, she wondered whether or not red eyes were any better than green.

But then irrationality left her, and she leaned back, continued her vigil. The Second Child would flush out the king. He would inevitably come through either this hallway, or the other. And Rei had to be ready, always ready, for checkmate.

* * *

Vividly, like the petals of a flower just come into bloom, flame-red flashed against the prevailing darkness. With a lioness' grace, Asuka Langely Sohryu somersaulted over a pile of boxes and glanced down the sight of her M-5. The guards were so predictable it was annoying. Silently she huffed to herself. After this moronically boring mission was finished, Misato, who had been unsurprised at Asuka's vehement admonition that she get the stealth role of the mission (after all, she had a point to prove!), would not longer be able to needle her on her lack of subtlety. 

That was the idea, anyway.

After this checkpoint, she would be able to activate her thermoptic camouflage and bypass all this useless stealth. She shook her head, wondering what had possessed the gang to hole up in a complex this _big_. It had taken her hours to laboriously work her way past seventy-two checkpoints, manned with human or robotic watchers trained to detect the telltale prismatic flash of thermoptics.

As the watcheyes pivoted to make the next leg of their rounds, she stalked past the boxes and pushed a button on the throat of her Combat Plug. She faded from view, and nonchalantly strolled into an expansive foyer, at the end of which stood two human sentries. Weapons poised, they scanned the empty foyer for signs of enemy intrusion. Asuka nodded to herself. They had set up an open killing field – anyone using thermoptics and hoping to cover the ground quickly would be detected and mowed down, while anyone attempting to sneak past would inevitably be caught by the guards' enhanced eyes. It was a clever system, and provided an adequate defense against conventional assault squads.

What a waste of time. Asuka strode brazenly down the hall, deactivating her camouflage as she went. Flicking her hair back, she grinned at the sentries as she advanced. For a moment, the guards were taken aback at the apparent foolishness of their enemy. Then, they decided not to look a gift horse in the mouth and opened fire, spraying high-velocity rounds that ate through the floor.

Asuka spread her AT field, and kept walking.

She saw one of the guards' eyes widen, and then his teeth clenched, his finger depressing the trigger furiously – as if that would somehow endow his bullets with strength. The other, however, had narrowed his eyes, a telltale sign of prolonged cyberbrain telepathy.

They were cleverer than she had thought. She dropped her AT field and sprang into the air, flipping her legs up. In that span of half a second, she placed two frictionless rounds through their foreheads. White blood sprayed against the walls, and they fell bonelessly.

As she landed, she kicked the door in, aware that the enemies were alerted to her presence. She quickly ducked back the doorframe, hair flaring behind her, as she anticipated the fusillade of shots to come.

Only they didn't.

Cautiously she peeked around the wall, crystal-blue eyes inquisitive. The kingpin, General Kirishima, was typing frenziedly into some kind of keyboard. He was flanked by two vacant-eyed attendants. Mildly confused, but highly irritated that she had missed any opportunity of getting some decent action on this mission, Asuka stepped in forcefully and leveled her pistol at the man's head.

"You're under arrest. Arms where I can see them."

They ignored her. The men continued staring blankly ahead in their business suits, arms crossed in the gesture typical of bodyguards everywhere. The General continued to punch keys rapidly, all the while muttering in a hurried dialogue.

"Yes, yes, I know it's too soon, but it'll almost be time anyway! You've got- We've got- STOP IT, 2501, haven't you ruined enough of my life already? What? Oh, yes, F5. No, no, I don't think so."

Asuka fumed. "I said, ARMS WHERE I CAN SEE THEM, BASTARD! I WILL SHOOT YOU!"

Spittle flecked from Kirishima's chin as he continued muttering. "Yes, yes, I know, it's almost done now. Then- then- You promised, 2501! You promised I could rest…Oh, well that's alright, it's all over soon, isn't it? You'll promise to keep good care of them? Good man. Can I call you a man? Oh, there we go, just in time and daybreak's soon anyway."

Thoroughly infuriated now, the Second Child sped over to the perspiring General and cocked back the hammer of her pistol as she shoved it viciously into his temple. He turned to her now, a lunatic grin plastered over his thick features, the pupils of his eyes rolling about in a discordant dance. Asuka blanched. This was the weirdest case of ghost-hacking she had ever seen.

And strangely, almost as if he – it? – had read her mind, an alien voice boomed across the hall, seemingly too big for Kirishima's pudgy mouth.

"**Oh, my child, the wonders you shall see.**"

And then Kirishima collapsed in an unmoving heap. His lackeys toppled likewise, and as Asuka stepped back hastily, startled, her chrono-relay malfunctioned for the second time in its existence.

**04:04:04 **

**Shamshael, Angel of Day**

And outside, blood-red light spilled over the nestling city like wine. The sun rose.


	7. Dawn

A/N: Please, for the love of EVA, review. If you love this story, tell me. If you hate it, tell me. If you think my writing is too wordy or too verbose or too highfalutin or just right or good enough or ANYTHING, just tell me, ok? Reviews are what motivate non-for-profit authors (like myself) to write. In fact, I'll make it easy for you. Multiple-choice.

A. If this were a person, I'd marry it. Hell, I'd marry it even if it weren't!

B. It's pretty good.

C. It's like Shinji. Boring as hell.

D. Kill yourself. Now.

Choose one. All you have to type is the letter.

* * *

Misato yawned blearily as her systems hummed to full awareness, one limp hand flapping restlessly around in a habitual frenzy. As the whining torment of the alarm clock was silenced, she sighed contentedly into her pillow, sprawled out over her futon in the questing haze that accompanied first wakefulness. A battered beer can tottered from a disheveled cabinet and clinked against her head.

_Should I wake up? Or go back to sleep? _

Caught evenly between duty and temptation, she started as a glaring white-and-blue vidpanel popped into her line of sight. Kaji Ryouji's blank white eyes stared at her, his jawline strangely solemn. She yawned again, irritation growing in her like a vine. First that damn alarm clock, and then this? She hoped Kaji wasn't going to spout bull like "I know how much you love to wake up to my face" at – her eyes flicked over to her table chronographer – 4:33 AM. She moaned and dropped her face back into the pillow, eyes defiantly shut. The vidpanel was still there, of course, superimposed on her vision. Kaji opened his mouth as if to speak, hesitated, and then-

_Here it comes._

"Misato."

Her head popped out of the morass that had occupied her futon, and she blinked. "Misato?" That was it? No cheesy comment or pick-up line? She thought she was worth more than that! She couldn't have been getting fat – cybernetic bodies had done away with that problem – but what if he was no longer interested? Relief shot through her like a high, then elation, then – was that disappointment. Gleefully she squelched it. And then another beer can came tumbling from the heavens, smiting her in reprimand. Thinking during the morning. Bad.

Kaji focused his impenetrable gaze on her. She realized that he looked serious, even more serious than the first time they had broken up. There were crow's feet splitting from his empty eyes, his hair was more rakishly splayed than usual, and his mouth was contorted into something that resembled a grimace. Uh-oh.

"Misato, there's been…a complication with the Children. The mission-

And there it came.

* * *

_Father did not say that it would be so bright. But he was a man of few words. _

Bleeding now, I had to see. One lunged away from me, crimson flow and living blue. Such a beautiful child, but she had yet to see the light. Tapping slashed crystal erupted now, splattering my side with silent shards. Another was coming now – he was an angry one. Even angrier than her, and far more terrible. He was a deception, a twist in the light of the soul. Two-in-one and broken dreams.

They planned on trapping me in this labyrinth of birth, fearing as they did the heavens' light. I knew fear too, fear that these wayward Children would succeed. But for them, I had to be brave. They were the future, you see? They were the light. Only through defeat do we ever learn. It is an experience, Father tells me, that they need more of.

And so I was born. But I could not grasp Day, for I was entombed here, a land of angular shadows wrapped in fluorescent shrouds. A ghost-land between All and None. I ripped through Mother's flesh, the craft of men, pylon-masks in an untrue reality. My claws bit and dug into the malleable darkness, spraying me with its detritus of no-light. Up, ever up, and then the light came, the true light, the day-light, and now I would make them See.

* * *

Asuka sprang back from the – she supposed she ought to call it Shamshael – thing and sent another urgent firing from her neurons into the cybernet. Shinji and Rei were already closing as rapidly as possible but another distress signal wouldn't hurt. Not when she had to deal with this monstrosity, alone. There was a time when she would have sneered at the Angel and challenged it with lone wolf ferocity. That was before the boiler room, and before Shinji had saved her, and she before hated him for it. (Not before she hated him, though.)

There was a thudding down the hall, distant, and it was euphony to Asuka. The glass next to her blew out and a murderous shadow fell through.

Shinji spun as he landed, bringing his arm-cannon to bear on the thing which Asuka had called Shamshael. It was a huge beast, vaguely bipedal, hunched-over and completely smooth. Four-fingered claws, over a meter in length, extended from its arms, and its entire surface – skin? – was livid orange but unruly, as if a tumescence throbbed right beneath it, injecting bursts of dapper red and molten yellow into the living montage. It had no neck. Instead, extending from its shoulders, and framed by an arch of pulsing flesh, was a single, lucidly transparent eye.

It pounced upon the ceiling and began a remorseless assault upon the architecture. Casually it ripped support beams out as if they were limbs from a body. Splinters, debris, and dust coated its passage in a ponderous fog.

_God, that thing is ugly, _Asuka shot at him. _Who knew we'd be facing some freak whose body looks like a tie-dye job with tomato juice splattered over it? _

Shinji shrugged. _It is pretty weird. Wonder what it wants? Hey, have you seen Rei? _

Asuka blasted him with a withering glare, then huffed and leapt into the crevasse left by the Angel's departure.

* * *

The sky was lachrymose with red. Like inkblots of crimson the light pooled across the vast expanse of Tokyo-3, catching the outlying spires in blooded hues, hesitant at first, dribbling and collecting in pinks that resembled washed-out flesh, then a surge, a torrent, an ocean of carnal red, harlot red, blood-red. The city was drenched in a forever of blood and the underworld capsized, washing its hands of that everywhere red and slithered back into its innumerable hovels. Daybreak had come to the blindest city in the world. 

And Shamshael rejoiced. For now he would have the light to show them all his wonders.

A/N: Yeah, it's short and it sucks. Don't sue me, though - I don't own EVA or GiTS. All feedback is appreciated (constructive criticism the most).

On an utterly unrelated note, I updated my profile, if anyone cares/wants to see.


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